And so, in my quest for a cross-racial mount, I took my level 36 Draenei priest to Ashenvale. Now, this is a zone I really don't enjoy playing in. The map discovery is very difficult, the terrain is tough to traverse, and everything is so spread out it takes forever to complete quests. I have not quested in this zone for about a year or more. All of my Night Elf alts I have leveled in human lands because I know the quests so well. But, like I said, I am on a personal quest to get my priest a palomino at 40, and so I trudged on into Ashenvale with a heavy heart.

In Astranaar I met up with Vindicator Palanaar (whose name seems an odd coincidence, don't you think?) who sent me on to Forest Song. Here is where I roll my eyes and groan, but travel out to Forest Song I did. What I was expecting to find was one random guy with two quests and a whole vacant ruin to himself. What I did find was something completely different. The Silverwing Sentinels are there, as is an ancient protector, not to mention a whole heap of Draenei. They even added a flight point. The area has been fixed.

It has been a while since I worked toward getting a cross-racial mount. I wasn't even really that interested in doing it with my alts until I started leveling my priest in the human lands to group with friends. All of a sudden she was honored with Stormwind and a seed was planted in my brain. I had a picture in my mind of a Draenei on a palomino, and it was a beautiful thing.

I didn't really start working on her rep until this week however, and man was I disappointed. Previous to Patch 2.1.0 people were raving about how easy it was to attain exalted reputation with any race in your faction, simply by completing all the Horde or Alliance quests in their starting areas. Eager to begin, I started out for Coldridge Valley, only to find out that I received absolutely no Stormwind reputation for doing quests for the dwarves. It wasn't until I got to Loch Modan that I received even a few points of rep. Even turning in the cloth for the other races affords me no additional faction with Stormwind. Tricky little devs changed it on me.

So it's not as simple as I thought, but I think it might still be doable. I played tour guide for an orphan, which got me about 500 rep or so. I am becoming a regular hero to the Night Elves, and soon will move on to questing for my own race (how novel.) But I am not sure I will have enough rep by the time I reach 40 to get my horse. Do you have any tips on how I can get extra rep now that Patch 2.1.0 is in effect? Is anyone out there doing the cross-racial mount thing along with me? Any tips you might have would be great. My priest thanks you.